


7sate: Origins

by chameleonwren



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins, Sense8 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Sense8 (TV) Fusion, Crossover, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-11
Updated: 2019-08-30
Packaged: 2019-10-08 06:30:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17381390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chameleonwren/pseuds/chameleonwren
Summary: DA Origins but if Thedosians could have sensate clusters





	1. Prologue: Renascence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Duncan births the cluster.

Duncan tears his gaze off of the mass of darkspawn - a veritable _hoard_ \- marching synchronous to the archdemon’s pulse. It does nothing to quell the dull beat from filling his head, however; echoes of the risen dragon’s call, beckoning him ever towards death. Out of sight, but always _rap-tap-tapping_ on his mind.

“The Fifth Blight,” Duncan grits his teeth together, forcing his words out in sharp, staccato hisses, “ _has_ begun.”

A dark-haired woman steps into view beside him. Her wearied eyes pointedly avoid Duncan’s, as her pinpoint focus draws her to, and only to, the hoard that slowly fills the forest at the bottom of the cliff-face they gather atop. Every muscle in her body tenses; though she is a right sight healthier than Duncan has ever seen her before. The sweet scent of herbal remedies wafts around her, sweeping Duncan into a brief but welcome tour of her workspace. Days away over mountains and across lakes; but distance means nothing to a sensate visiting one of her own cluster.

“Then, it is their time.” Her voice resonates in Duncan’s mind as she speaks. “They will be ready now.”

“Time? To condemn them all to die, you mean?” Duncan feels he ought to laugh, to soften the blow, but pushes on. After all, _he_ is Warden-Commander now - _now_ that Fiona is no Grey Warden at all. “Haven’t you learned yet, that our kind _do not surpass_ the darkspawn?”

She flinches at his words. Duncan feels the same heat rise in him that he sees in her; flaring her nostrils and testing her patience. He reconsiders, but in doing so still cannot muster any guilt for his words. “We need warriors, Fiona. _Fighters_ , not _sensitive souls_.” His tone shifts, ringing with mockery now. Fiona gives no response as she begins to pace, her footsteps falling into time with the hoard's march.

Great cracks of lightning snake through clouds on the horizon, tinged a vibrant red in the unnatural purple hue of the swelling Blight. The colour doesn’t touch Fiona’s robes, or light the sides of her face, however. When she moves, a different, distant candlelight catches her midnight robes. Her light brown skin appears darker in the dim candlelight, its uneven flickering casting deep shadows across her freckled cheeks and brow. Duncan follows the warmth of the candlelight, shifting to visit Fiona on her side of Ferelden.

Still, thunder groans between them. An inconsistency that washes away any stream of logic, drowning them in its mismatched rhythm. Duncan bows his head, letting the soothing herbal scents from Fiona’s work waft over him. He manages to tune out the marching beat. Eyes closing as he brings himself to Fiona’s small, safe little workshop. “I only mean to keep them all from… needless tragedy.”

Fiona’s heels snap together at the sheer edge of the cliff. She hasn’t taken her eyes off the darkspawn.

“ _That’s_ tragedy,” she thrusts a clenched jaw toward the hoard, “marching toward us, and it won’t stop coming.” Duncan feels the pressure of her anger in his own teeth. Though it is nothing compared to the growing pressure of sensebirth on his psyche. “Even the _one_ remaining of my young cluster can make a difference, and those fallen still give meaning for those who live on.” She is right; as right as any subjective will or hope can ever be. Duncan believes her readily, clings to her words as an Andrastian holds their faith, but he is still swallowed by the calling’s deep depression; any hope withers in dread of his outward demeanor.

“Only for those who still have a future,” his comment is hypocrisy, perhaps. Fiona certainly seems to think so, as she scoffs at his words.

“ _Your future_ is as vast as mine, and will only be richer after this. Your world grows, to give it all to them. It's going to be beautiful,” she promises, and draws in an even breath for both of them. Silently, Duncan is grateful for it. He uses it to even his breathing while she speaks. “Trust me, Duncan. It is their time; they will be reborn in this moment, and you along with them.”

Duncan falls silent. She is still right; somehow, from a certain perspective, she always is.

“Leave me, then. I don’t need you holding my hand while I’m-” he tenses, “in _labour_.”

“I will just be drawn back to you at the moment of rebirth,” Fiona extends her arms toward him. He often _says_ he doesn’t need help, but only as someone so unaccustomed to receiving it.

“ _Fi—_ I need privacy.”

Fiona gives an almost motherly scowl but with a blink she is gone from the cliffside, taking the candle’s warmth and the herbal scents with her.

Duncan crouches on the ground, facing away from the hoard. Fiona was always openly transfixed by the masses of darkspawn. She once explained to him that it was necessary for her; that the sight of a darkspawn hoard had only ever come to her when she most needed to see it. When she needed to be reminded of the darkspawn’s scope, of their hungry, aching, endless consumption. Only then, and never otherwise.

Privately, Duncan wishes as much luck to the children of his cluster. An impossible fantasy, of course, but isn’t that the very nature of a wish? He tries to hold onto the whim as a jolt of pain, unlike any other, ripples through his body; either beginning or coming to an end in his mind. Another wave of pain proves it to be a cycle. A rising, and a fall. Soon there was no break between the end of one wave and the beginning of the next, it becomes a constant pulling; a stretching of his mind, to accommodate more and more of the world around him. The clenched fists on the ground before him are no longer his own - they are an echo, or a memory, of this moment. An imprint stamped into the earth and swallowed up by the Fade and all its denizens.

He would not remember this: _the pain_ , the strain of his muscles and the _screaming_. When he looks back on the moment of his cluster’s birth, he would only remember how it felt to look upon the faces of his children for the first time.

One by one and all at once, they see each other.

Flanked by soldiers at the shore of a flat, off-coloured lake; Myrddin Amell takes the sight of the armoured rogue a great a deal better than the stampede of darkspawn in the valley below.

Absorbed in filing a nick from his blade, Eska Brosca nearly misses the vision altogether, though hardly finds it out of place against the dusty backdrop of the every day.

Blanched by icy terror, Eileen Cousland excuses herself from the family dinner table to find a private place to panic - and churn up her platter.

Under the shade of a lonely tree, Turi Tabris stirs from his evening meditation with one eye open; one eye closed.

Lulled by bliss in an explicitly intimate moment, Kaeran Aeducan pulls back the legs of her bedpartner to beg him softly answer whether _he sees the omen too?_

Of the Fade or of the mind, Vhennug Surana ignores the hallucination all through class, the same as any other.

Up in the branches of an enormous oak, overlooking an endless expanse of wilderness, Sulahn Mahariel strums a broken lyre and sings about the end of the world.


	2. Upon the precipice of change

 

Silken bedsheets are a considerable luxury to own in Dust Town. Honest friends bearing gifts of such luxuries could surely be taken as omen of a blessed life, but omens are easy to ignore on an empty, aching stomach.

 

Eska accepts the parcel from his friend all the same. Silken soft and out of place in his dirty hands. He spares a glance over his friend’s hands: comparatively scarred and calloused, each missing a different finger. The miner’s life took its toll quickly and without mercy.

 

Where pity is an easy emotion for Eska, gratitude is not. As the unfamiliar sensation warms his chest, Eska clenches his jaw and reaches out to grab his miner friend by the arm and pull them in closer.

 

“Why?” He demands, steel grip trapping the other close enough to smell their lyrium all over them.

 

“It’s a _gift_ , dear thing. Don’t go all _questioning_ on it- just be like _thanks, Ananth, you’re a real sweetheart,_ so we can move on?”

 

Ananth’s cheer only pushes Eska deeper into suspicion. His eyes narrow and he pulls Ananth closer still, repeating his question without speaking at all: _What do you want in exchange?_

 

Ananth makes no effort to escape Eska’s grip; only takes the moment to gaze into his eyes and smile. “Just wanted to give you something nice, but now you’re all… _ruining it_ , Eska, you’re making this _very_ _hard.”_

Eska releases his grip with a frown, and turns away to place the gift-wrapped sheets atop the only clean surface available. A simple dresser, kept with considerably more care than the few other pieces of furniture. Ananth had already heard the tale; it was Eska’s father’s, a sky-brained Merchant lost to the surface.

 

“Thanks, Ananth.”

 

A smile stretches across Ananth’s face at the words, they’re so easily pleased to hear them. They give a graceful curtsy in response. Eska lifts an eyebrow as he beholds it, noting the increased stability since he last saw them curtsy.

 

“You’ve been practicing.” He nods appreciatively. Ananth’s smile grows again; contagious, perhaps, as it also inspires a smile from Eska. Which fades as quickly as it spread.

 

Ananth lets out a whistle, short and low. Their little thinking song. Eska watches through narrowed eyes, studying Ananth’s twitching features as some thought process carries out behind their eyes. He settles then, sensing that he’s about to find out the true _Why_ of their doting.

 

“There is, uh- _another_ _reason_ I visited.” Ananth hums, glancing about the room. Eska gives no response in the pause Ananth leaves, and so they carry on, beginning to wander around the Brosca’s bedroom as they speak. “’Cause I know all about your assignment, with Oskias- look, he’s- teensy bit _needed_ so just go and leave the lad breathing for me, yeah?” Ananth fiddles with the decorative bow they’d tied around the bedsheets, trying not to catch Eska’s eye. They already feel his disapproval without sharing his piercing gaze.

 

After seconds of silence pass between them, Ananth clears their throat and adds, “Listen, it’d be right to _hurt_ him a little, bu-”

 

“Did _you_ steal Beraht’s lyrium?” Eska’s voice is even, but Ananth swears they hear a jovial lilt in the delivery. It draws a near _snarl_ from their otherwise serene features.

 

“ _Seriously-?_ ” They stop themself from saying anything more, anything they might _regret_. They turn to face Eska, now, matching his frown. Their stares become glares within seconds, but Ananth tears themself away with a scowl.

 

Eska watches, unphased.

 

“Oskias is good folk. He’s a _friend_. It’s not like he crossed your paranoid crime god just to spite the guy-”

 

“Beraht wants him dead,” Eska’s asserts evenly, giving Ananth pause.

 

It would hardly be the first murder Eska had been forced into committing on Beraht’s behalf. “And you just told me he did it…”

 

“Fine,” Ananth’s demeanor suddenly shifts. “Okay that’s still workable, it’s fine.”

 

Eska tilts his head in inquiry.

 

“Got plans, actually.” Ananth sighs heavily, their left hand beginning to slap nervously against their thigh. Eska feels their shaking, tapping, bouncing, all at once, knocking against his skull and grating his senses. He grips Ananth’s hand in his own to cease the irritable stimming, fixing them with a stern glare. It makes no difference; Ananth’s body wriggles on beneath his grip.

 

“Plans?” Eska asks flatly, all energy devoted to holding Ananth’s hand still.

 

“Same as always. _I’ll_ do it,” Ananth nods to themself, beginning to settle. “I’ll be the one in the shop - be _my own_ link in the chain, right? Genius as always, Ananth-”

 

“With that there brand on your face?” Eska’s eyebrows disappear beneath his flat flop of fringe. “ _Right_. Sure, you will, dreamer.”

 

Ananth grins. “No, _really-_ alright, we’ll be.” Tension slips from their body, evoking a short laugh of relief. “Got me plans. Y’know, one o’ my _dreams_. Go on, call me _dreamer_ again.”

 

“Glad you’re still smiling, _dreamer_ ,” Eska snorts, letting go of their hand. “Now get out, I got _work_.”

 

“ _Uegh._ _Really_ not right to call that _work_ ,” Ananth huffs, mumbling under their breath as they move to leave. Then, with jerky, sideways footsteps, they loop back suddenly. “But that’ll mean your bed’s free, won’t it?” They glance toward an ancient mattress crammed into a nook with longing Eska recognises all too well. He gestures freely, and Ananth hops over to the bed in a rush, scooping up the silk sheets along the way.

 

“If Rica comes home-” Eska starts, only to be interrupted by the gleeful Ananth.

 

“I’ll be a proper courtly friend and let her have the comfy half,” they promise with a trill. Then, slightly more seriously, “and she won’t get a _whiff_ of my blue, cousin. That’s too precious to share.”

 

It seems to content Eska, who falls into his comfortable silence. It was very unlikely Rica would be home for days yet, anyway. She’d had a tightening hold on a promising noble for months now. Though she’d only share the Nobleman’s name if it turned certain. Rica wouldn’t bother reporting on a loose end until it was tied. That was something the Brosca siblings had in common. They never spared a word unless they could die by it.

 

The sight of Ananth spreading sheets across his bed honestly makes leaving for work much easier, Eska notes internally on his way out. Avoiding a confrontation with his mother while she was drunk _also_ made leaving for work much easier. He ducks past her as she lifts a bottle to her lips, timing his footsteps to her gulps and passing unseen behind a pint of mosswine.

 

She would mellow out by the time he returned home, and then he could cover her in blankets and hide her poison for the night.

 

Rica would comfort her, if she were here. Stroke her hair and escort her to bed. His treatment was harsh by comparison. Maybe he wasn’t as strong as Rica, or maybe their mother had a favorite. It didn’t matter. Lamenting his own inabilities was a waste of time.

 

He had a job to get done.

 

Reliably, his partner-in-whatever their _paranoid crime god_ wanted done, Leske, was waiting just outside the front door. He’d been forced into a physical confrontation with Kalah Brosca one too many times to ever brave entering the Brosca threshold again. Glass was a nightmare to pick out of a gushing wound - a lesson he and Eska had taught their boss’ enemies within the week.

 

Yet more reliably, the stench of Dust Town greets Eska before Leske. Curiously, so does a gust of air, and a horrifying sensation of the unfamiliar.

 

In alarmed response, Eska’s gaze darts across the rock high above. There could well be a breach in the stone, leaking air from the surface, causing such a breeze. It persists, grazing over his exposed skin. Like a heavy exhale snorted from a bronto’s nostrils.

 

“Ceiling’s more important than your best pal, huh?” Leske gives a rough chuckle, knocking Eska’s shoulder with his own.

 

Eska gives the ceiling a final scan before resting his gaze on Leske’s wrinkled brow. The breeze drops, or passes. Whatever it is breezes are accustomed to doing all the way up there above the crust.

 

“Somethin’ bothering you?” Leske prompts again.

 

Eska doesn’t want to respond, without any way to explain what had occurred.

 

He could try: _I sensed something which wasn’t there._

Or try again: _I thought for a moment I was among my people, topside, in an elven village. I could smell wood, though I don’t know what trees smell like._

Keep awkwardly trying: _I felt an impossible wind._

_It all felt as real as the vision of doom that overwhelmed me last week..._

A vision he also had no way of explaining; thus, a vision he hadn’t shared with anyone. Perhaps he should’ve told Leske but no words came to him that could do the experience justice. At least, no words which felt comfortable in the mouth of a petty assassin, who’d never known a day’s worth of learning that didn’t end in blood.

 

Eska simply shrugs at Leske, stepping past him and bumping shoulders in return.

 

* * *

 

450 miles away, well above the earthen crust, a young city elf feels the ache in his shoulder. Like something as sturdy as a stone wall had slammed against him, twice.

 

Instead of the familiar Alienage architecture, his senses tell him of a warm, dark, stone-forged city nestled deep below ground. Briefly, he is privy to another’s inability to verbalise their thoughts. A mind as real to him as _the vision of-_

 

Turi shakes clear the scrambled thoughts from his head. He was only losing himself in daydreams because he was arranged to be _married_ in the vague but impending future.

 

That, or the vision of doom which overwhelmed him- last week? Hadn’t that thought only just occurred to him? His thoughts had been so scattered ever since…

 

It all returns at once. The valley full of darkspawn and their horrors. The armored rogue. The blighted corpses surrounding him. The ghost of a motherly presence…

 

With the sights again come the nausea and the dread but with them, a tangled thread of hope. His vision would lead to answers; Turi had faith in that. The darkspawn could bring opportunity, might even scare out the human lords which polluted his community. It was a perspective at odds with the general misfortunes Turi had faced but his composure persisted in even the stormiest weather.

 

Today’s weather was far from stormy. Either the Hahren had planned for Soris’ wedding to land on a day of predictably fine weather, or the Gods were in good spirits.

 

Songs of celebration, shouted brazenly by party-goers, reach Turi over the ambient hustle of wedding preparations and arriving guests. They do little to unknot the dread in his gut. Though he had slept through the night, he couldn’t honestly say that he had _rested_. It was a mild mark of shame, for Turi, to have overslept on the day of his closest kin’s wedding. Soris would need support today but here Turi was all gaping yawns, still dressed in yesterday’s work clothes.

 

Turi squints sleepily up at the sun. His eyes adjust slowly and poorly to the bright light, still dwelling on his long, weird dreams of living in a dwarven city.

 

It was well past midday, that was certain. Soris’ wedding ceremony was supposed to start soon. If Soris weren’t such a gentle person, he’d rightly be furious.

 

Turi quickens his pace.

 

He finds the groom hiding beneath the Vhenadahl, nursing a mug of wine which he didn’t seem at all interested in. The second the pair make eye contact, Soris visibly relaxes.

 

“Good to see you’re finally awake, cousin,” Soris laughs, though it comes out short and stunted.

 

Turi’s hands sign a response, brow tensing, _‘I’m so sorry that I slept in’._

Soris brushes off the apology with a friendly pat on the shoulder. One hand holds the mug out at an awkward distance from the delicate embroidery on his linen shirt. His other hand palms repetitively at the hem of matching trousers. Soris opens his mouth to respond but the sounds are drowned out by a gaggle of high-pitched voices, each echoing with a different cadence of laughter.

 

“Soris!” One of the voices cuts above the rest. “Turi! You made it!” Their spitfire cousin Shianni collides with Turi fondly, pulling him into a hug. “How do you always manage such perfect timing?” She posits the question seriously, but moves on before it can be answered.

 

Scooping the mug of wine out of Soris’ hand, Shianni holds it with her own and guides Soris over to the rest of the wedding party, sipping wine as she walks. The skirt of her dress, which looks as though several forests have been stitched together, swishes after her heels dramatically.

 

“Is this-?” Soris begins but, as Shianni’s rapid head-nodding confirms that he was indeed about to meet his betrothed, he falls silent. 

 

Turi follows behind them, peering ahead at the four women dressed for the occasion. Mother Boann stands as one of them; her _humble_ chantry robes manage to be several tiers of fancy higher than the virescent bridesmaids’ gowns.

 

“Valora,” Shianni’s sing-song voice carries across the courtyard, catching the young woman’s attention. “Meet your dashing husband-to-be,” she continues cheerfully once within talking distance. “Soris,” she announces him to Valora and the two other bridesmaids, pulling the groom forwards.

 

“Hello,” Soris lifts one hand in greeting, then the other. Then drops them both back to his side and blushes, looking away. “You look… stunning,” he compliments the dirt to the left of his betrothed. Shakily, he steps aside, feet knocking together. “Oh, this is Turi,” Soris’ arms wave toward his cousin in a desperate diversion.

 

Turi bows his head in greeting but remains silent. Save for a slight smirk at Soris’ behaviour, he barely responds at all.

 

_Stunning, indeed._

 

“It’s so lovely to meet you both,” Valora smiles warmly.

 

“And you as well,” Soris quickly returns.

 

When Turi still says nothing, Valora’s smile turns quizzical and she glances askance to deliver Shianni a pointed look.

 

“Turi doesn’t speak,” Shianni explains, sharing a smile with the mute in question.

 

“Oh,” Valora pauses, “how do you… sorry, nevermind,” she laughs nervously at herself. Mother Boann offers the bride an understanding smile, before leaning in to whisper something to her privately.

 

“This is Nola,” Shianni moves on, introducing a raven-haired woman who waves timidly.

 

The introductions are rushed on again as Nola withdraws behind the third bridesmaid. Unknowingly, she steps into reach of a human who’d snuck in behind the bridesmaids with a small entourage of his own.

 

Nola finds herself dragged away from her friends before even registering the humans’ presence.

 

“Get off of me,” she snaps, tone defiant and confident until she twists in place and sees the strange human features leering over her, exhaling ale stench directly into her face. Her confidence drains in seconds.

 

The human’s grip relaxes around her forearms as fear freezes her in place. The man snickers, stroking down the length of her arms and leaning his body against hers. Nola begs, hesitant, before simply pulling herself away from the stranger’s grip. She promptly flees to the safety of her friends, who shield her from the intruding humans.

 

“It’s a party, isn’t it?” The groper slurs, following Nola back over to the bridal party. “Grab a whore and have a good time,” he pairs his taunt with a leer at Shianni, before turning to address the three men whom tailed behind him. “Savour the hunt, boys.”

 

Every elf present, as if by instinct, turns to the approaching humans. Four of them in fine silk shirts and pressed trousers. They could only be Noblemen, and they could only be here looking for _trouble_.

 

“Take this little elven wench here,” the nobleman continues, his attention back on Shianni, who visibly tenses under his gaze. “So young, and vulnerable…” he trails off suggestively, but his obvious antagonism sparks the fire of resistance in Shianni.

 

She steps forwards defiantly, mimicking the wide arc of his shoulders and his proudly risen chin. “Touch me and I’ll _gut_ you, you _pig_ ,” she spits.

 

“Please, my lord,” Shianni’s father cuts in, flanking her defensively. “We’re celebrating weddings, here!”

 

“Silence, _worm!_ ” Vaughan’s words are punctuated by the dry _slap_ of palm striking cheek. Shianni backs away as her father topples, saved from a nasty crash into the dirt by his family. All of them bow their bright red heads in submission; none dare speak a word.

 

A handful of on-lookers in the courtyard step forwards, Turi among them, spurred by adrenaline. He feels a hand on his arm, holding him back, and turns to see Soris restraining him.

 

“I know what you’re thinking, but maybe we shouldn’t get involved-?”

 

Turi pulls away, using both hands to sign to Soris: _‘We outnumber them.’_

 

“Fine,” Soris relents, “but let’s try to be diplomatic, shall we?”

 

Their conversation had already drawn the nobleman’s gaze. He was striding over to them with a snide confidence. It would seem the man had a flair for the dramatic; opening his arms wide to greet them in an exaggerated and booming tone. “What’s this?” He chuckles. “The groom here to welcome me personally?”

 

“L-look,” Soris did his best to sound confident, “can we just talk about this?”

 

“Maybe you should invite it over for dinner!” Another nobleman shouts over Soris, drawing a harsh laugh from the rest of them, especially the one whom behaved like their leader.

 

“Do you have _any_ idea _who I am_?” The human leans over Soris, taking full advantage of the height difference between them to intimidate the groom into submitting.

 

A bitter hatred drags Turi into action. As though a separate presence steps inside his body to perform the deed. Dread swells in the place of his senses, forcing its goading will over every fibre of his being.

 

Turi darts between Soris and the nobleman, arms lifting by some invisible strings. Fingers tense into two solid bricks of bone and muscle.

 

With a quick tilt backwards on his heels, Turi rocks into the momentum and punches upwards with both fists. Two sharp jabs dig his knuckles into the nobleman’s proudly exposed neck, crunching delicate bones and cutting off the man’s boast.

 

Turi watches the nobleman’s eyes bulge hideously while gasping for air and dropping to his knees. Slowly, the weight of the deed sinks in.

 

He has no time to check if he’d actually killed the nobleman or simply scattered his senses. The other humans start clutching at Turi’s shoulders; wrestling with each other as much as they were with him as they attempt a collective effort to beat the offending elf unconscious.

 

Two of the humans manage to decide which of Turi’s arms to restrain, while another alternates between lunging for Soris - who periodically dodges backwards with a yelp - and striking Turi in some fashion.

 

Turi hears the metallic rainfall of shattering glass, before another fist collides with his cheek. The impact reverberates through his body, shaking his consciousness loose. He drifts, empty but listening. Every shout in his direction muffles to ringing. Voices still reach him, but they echo from miles away and through an unfamiliar sense...

 

_“It’s a pleasure to meet you” ... “venerable warrior of the Grey” ... “Aeducan House is honored by your visit”_

_... “Consider the politics, Eileen” ...“The Wardens have not been welcome in Ferelden for years” ... “this is a madness”_

* * *

 

“What’re you doing, salroka? Finish the job before blood gets on the walls. You know how they are about _presentation_ ,” Leske’s voice trails off.

 

Panic dissipates.

 

Eska frowns at Leske. The sensation of hands gripping his forearms, restraining him, had been _real_. If it wasn’t Leske-?

 

Though this wasn’t the first _bizarre_ sensation to trick him recently…

 

Eska turns back to Oskias. Two slashes to his throat hollow the merchant’s voice, silencing any dying screams. Venoms would be thickening the blood in his veins by now. Eska could tell by his victim’s widened eyes and twitching brow. It was the same pleading expression every other victim of his poisons held: puzzled, seeking, desperate for a way to stop the spreading numbing but the tension never leaves their eyes.

 

Oskias dies with a strained glare.

 

Even when Eska looks away, the expression stays with him. If history was any indicator, it will stay with him well into his next few appointments with Beraht.

 

Returning to his boss’ shopfront was a rote action after so long under the Carta’s thumb. Eska follows the path back by a precise muscle memory.

 

Beraht was as easily pleased by the words _They’re dead_ as usual. More ready to reclaim his lost nuggets of lyrium, and to burden Eska with his next dangerously unsavory mission: To rig the Proving.

 

First, Eska and Leske would enter the Proving Grounds with the pass Beraht arranged for them. Once inside, they would locate two of the fighters – Everd, and Mainar – and learn the time of their scheduled duel.

 

Everd must be tended to, assisted with whatever he fancied. Mainar was to be sabotaged with poison.

 

When the two met on the battlefield, Everd would walk away the winner or Beraht would lose every scrap of metal he’d bet on the match, and Eska would be first in line for recompense.

 

As Beraht explains the task, Eska can only admire the cage around him. Each bar forged of obligation and ever-amounting debt. Beraht leaves no space for questions once finished. Any complaint or defense Eska might imagine is deconstructed before he can muster a way to say it, anyway.

 

Eska only ever has one thing to say to Beraht: “Yes, Boss.”

 

With that, he’s back on the hunt. Nothing changed.

 

Oskias’ body would be carted out of the tavern. The regulars would speak ill of the _dusters_ and their cruel games. Beraht’s claim would remain unchallenged. Eska would be ordered to eliminate the next sucker who inconvenienced his boss, and the next, and each strained glare would layer atop the rest…

 

Possibly, a longer, drawn-out murder would stay with him for less time than the quick ones. Maybe for the next hit who deserved it, he’d work in a little torture. Just to vent his frustrations, to see if his visions of death and ruin abated.

 

More likely, they would haunt him longer still. Weigh on him heavier and heavier, until the burden crippled him permanently. He was in so deep already though, it just seemed logical to consider. He might need to embrace the work, embody the villain, play his role; _express_ himself, through the only means of self-expression available. 

 

He could not fight under the Warrior’s mantle. He could not forge with the tools of a Smith. He could not even spin tales of legendary weapons to wide-eyed customers, as his father had once done in the Merchant’s market. He was dust. To be swept away and ignored, abandoned with the trash and whatever else wasn’t deemed polite to discuss. Any potential brewing in his bones was dismissed by the castes before he could ever realise it.

 

Leske would remark upon such matters with a cackle. He was proud of his humble origins, and of the loving family he worked hard to support. The work itself was secondary to him, the only means to a worthy end. What Leske dwelled on was the careful approach; how to deflect suspicion or aggression. That was the key to a long and happy life in Dust Town, Leske always said. Bejeweled nobles recoiling in disgust from the _ink_ on his cheek was simply funny to Leske.

 

Their fear just proved them weaker than he was. Their need to be pampered and pandered to and segregated from those _begging brands_ (who keep asking for things they don’t _deserve_ \- like a decent breakfast, or a chance to defend themselves) was more pathetic to Leske than their image of the _Duster,_ which left so many castes quaking in their sturdy, tailored boots.

 

Eska couldn’t bring himself to mock the castes, not the way Leske did. While Leske had his long and happy life in Dust Town, Eska dwelled on the rising number of dwarves he’d sent back to the Stone. He believed himself the cruel and callous killer, hopeless and without a purpose. Never to amount to anything.

 

His mother was right about him, and she always had been. He was, after all, just dust. His father was wise to have abandoned him.

 

“ _Eska!_ ” Leske’s voice finally reaches in from worlds away. “You’re spiraling again. Salroka, what’s on your mind?”

 

Eska couldn’t think of anything to say. Again and again, the same problem drains him. _I’m afraid;_ just words, just sounds, but they strangle him. _We’re going to get caught. We’ll be arrested. We’ll be killed for this, just like we deserve._

His panic must have distorted his vision, as another omen appears to him. In the once empty walkway to the Proving Grounds, a figure sits with their head bowed, shoulders shaking, holding their knees together with leather-bound wrists. They were lit by a candle which flickered out of sight, casting a shadow of rigid bars striping across their huddled form.

 

The vision pairs with no tangible bars to cast the shadow but it isn’t difficult for Eska to imagine them. Forged of debt and ever-growing obligation, or forged of the very darkness itself.

 

Eska swallows hard and turns to face Leske’s hardening brow.

 

“I keep...” he starts, but trails off. Leske lifts an eyebrow, nodding him on to continue. Eska clears his throat for a second attempt. “I keep _seeing_ things.”

 

He regrets the words the moment he says them. It sounds _pitiful_ , stupid or meaningless, and Leske’s response only proves how _wrong_ he was to have said anything at all.

 

“Well, there are a lot of things to see, you know?” He laughs. Perhaps an honest attempt at lightening Eska’s mood but it only stiffens his spine. Leske shakes his head, perhaps apologetic. “What are you seeing?”

 

Eska clenches his fists together. Deep in thought he looks almost serene but the illusion shatters when he shoves Leske away from him roughly. “Nothing. Nevermind.” He walks toward the Proving Grounds, ignoring the figure in the middle of the walkway when they reach out toward him. Eska hadn’t noticed them look up but the stranger has been silently watching him this whole time.

 

Leske’s muffled voice doesn’t reach Eska as he soldiers past the omen and their big, dark eyes; each wearing a wet streak of tears beneath. Their eyes look unnaturally large. It isn’t until Eska sees the very tips of tapered ears between tufts of hair that he realises why.

 

There are, of course, questions Eska could posit to the huddled elf: _What are you doing here? What message do you bring?_ After questions would come answers, presumably. The stranger would tell him that’s he marked for death, going mad, already dead; the Titans have cursed him; the Stone is abandoning his dusty soul to a passing breeze.

 

The only answers Eska sought were the locations of Everd and Mainar. Those were the only questions he’d be posing today, if he had any say in it.

 

Though Eska could always trust the Stone and all its dwarven hands not to give him a say in anything.

 

Almost exactly as he thinks on this, he spies the four dwarves guarding the Proving entrance sneer at him and Leske. Eska emulates the sneer, expression distorting with a wave of repressed tension. An irritable shout grows in his throat and he lets it out with a sharp exhale of spit.

 

The guards sneer again, a couple openly mock Eska’s out-cry.

 

Eska turns away from them, facing the opposite direction down the bridge away from Grounds entrance. Leske hovers to his side, asking question after pressing question, his eyebrows tensing and tensing and turning to stone before Eska’s very eyes.

 

He doesn’t want to be here- he doesn’t want to leave but he doesn’t want to walk through those doors and he doesn’t want to greet those guards. He doesn’t want to go anywhere but he doesn’t want to be here. Maybe he doesn’t want to be alive, he thinks, shaking.

 

Eska gazes back down the walkway, trying to ignore his friend’s buzzing concern. The image of the weeping elf was gone but in their place was a dwarf of noble caste, wearing what must have been their finest plate. Though curiously alone, they were steadily approaching…

 

Approaching the entrance to the Grounds… walking directly toward him and Leske. Eska darts aside, knowing better than to keep standing in their way. When Leske doesn’t immediately do the same, Eska reaches for him with one hand and points out the noble with his other.

 

 _“Are you alright?”_ It isn’t Leske’s voice who says this. It is one deeper, smoother, lighter on the tongue. The noble’s head tilts as she asks, but Eska stares at the ground in silence. It takes him a moment to realise the noble is actually talking to him and even when he considers such, doesn’t quite believe she’d care _how_ he _felt-_

 

“Are you talking to me?”

 

“ _Yes!_ ” Leske squawks in his ear as the noble nods calmly.

 

For a moment, he feels a reprisal of emotion. _Gratitude_ , as he receives a gift. No object, not tangible, but given with a generous heart all the same. A sense of calm takes hold. A serene and sincere promise of explanation.

 

Eska clenches his eyes closed, tight as they can go and then a little bit tighter. Bright dots bloom across the back of his eyelids and without noticing, pinprick tears dot each eye.

_“Duncan will make sense of it soon.”_ Behind closed eyes, Eska hears a smile in the voice. A gentle kindness. It eclipses the other sounds around him.

 

When he opens his eyes to address the stranger, only Leske is standing on the bridge with him.

 

Of course, it had been another vision. The only people on the bridge at all were he, Leske, and the dwarves on guard.

 

Eska takes a moment to find words.

 

“I’ll tell you… later…” _when I know how._

 

Slowly, Eska pulls out Beraht’s Proving pass and hands it out to Leske. The favor he means to ask is inherent, apparently, as Leske nods before Eska can ask it of him.

 

Leske doesn’t bother with any other response. Tinges of annoyance and regret bubble beneath the surface as he takes the pass from Eska and heads off toward the guards. Eska follows a step behind.

 

Only one guardwarf speaks up when they move closer.

 

“Turn around, brand. No casteless on the Grounds.”

 

The guard’s distaste draws a soft chuckle from Leske but Eska steels himself to stand several inches shorter. Leske flashes the pass with the subtle grace of a live stage performer. The guard squints over it, checking every inch, then waves them forward stonily.

 

“A pleasure to work with you, gentlemen,” Leske drawls, sarcasm hardly noticeable. The pair enter the Proving Grounds without further inquiry.

 

Leske shares a victorious slap on the shoulder with Eska as they clear the giant doors.

 

Impossibly tall walls bend further up away from them, rising into a vast chamber ceiling, decorated all the way with brass inlays depicting battles of old. The deep brass plaques glisten in the low candlelight of the Proving foyer.

 

Sconces holding the lights ring around every pillar, giving the scenes carved into them a life-like movement. The entire foyer sways with a flickering rhythm, pulling every spectator into its fanatical beat. The atmosphere quickly sets itself.

 

Eska takes it all in as quickly as possible, walking forwards stiffly. Through Leske’s eyes, Eska’s rigid movement only has one explanation: Eska was trying to blend in, to seem as though this path was one which he walked every day and not the rarest, grandest experience of his life.

 

Leske catches up quickly; his own awe is not one he cares to diminish for the sake of mollifying nearby dwarves of caste.

 

“Isn’t it all so-” Leske sighs with the many words he could use to describe the extravagance, “-wonderful, dreadful, _inspiring?_ ” He huddles close to Eska, hoping to ease his partner into enjoying the moment a little more. “Look at this pillar! Oh- I just saw that wall carving there, now that’s worth a second or two.” Leske speeds past Eska with a skip to his step.

 

Eska carries on with limbs locked, tight-jawed and shaking slightly. None of his visions had followed him onto the Grounds but it occurs to him that any of the crowd could be just some manner of incorporeal visitor. Most clustered together in small groups but that didn’t necessarily rule them out as visions. When this all started, he’d eyed an entire _hoard_ of darkspawn through this foggy spyglass of the mind.

 

Eska finds himself inspecting each person closely. His pace slows.

 

Amber eyes glance over passing attendees. Ahead of him, Leske stands enraptured by the spiraling textures worked into a stone pillar.

 

 _When this all started…_ seeing the sky in that vision had reminded Eska of his absent father.

For the first time in years, Eska tries to recall his father’s face.

 

All he can muster is the face of the man who crouched atop that cliffside. In his mind, that human face sits between motherly and paternal. A second later it bridges the gap between offer and demand.

 

He feels the presence first; then, by instinct, glances in the right direction. Stepping briefly into a view, a human weaves gracefully through dwarves half his height and pillars thrice his width. Eska sees eventual glimpses of orange leather, gleams of white metal, and that face.

 

That perfectly recreated face, as if plucked straight from his vision.

 

Eska passes Leske, eyes fixed on the human. Duncan.

 

_Duncan will make sense of it soon…_

 

Leske follows his gaze. Clad in striking foreign armor, the tall human stands out brazenly.

 

“Stone’s embrace!” Leske gasps. The fanatical atmosphere must have gotten to him. “That’s one of them! One of the Grey Wardens!” Leske genuinely sounds impressed.

 

Eska might have been impressed too, if he wasn’t so overwhelmed. Leske’s response at least confirmed the human was not only Eska’s to see. He approaches the Grey Warden without a word.

 

Duncan would make sense of it _right_ damn _now_.

 

The sensation of someone approaching bounces off him. Duncan feels him nearby but doesn’t turn.

 

Eska knows instinctively that his presence has been registered. He finds himself at ease with it and in the fragile second as he approaches Duncan, imagines himself a second life. He is still a fighter in this second life. He is still bound by laws older than his mother. There are still bars of a cage poised around him on all sides but in this life, he holds the key.

 

Eska takes a steady breath. The Warden turns to face him; both are silent until Eska manages to speak.

 

“Decent of you to really be here this time.”

 

The Grey Warden’s soft chuckle settles the best of Eska’s worries. Enough of them that he feels comfortable laughing with the human.

 

“You’ll have to forgive my prior intrusion on your senses,” the Warden drops an octave as he speaks, flattering the naturally deep timbre of his voice. “It was overwhelming for us both, rest assured. My name is Duncan, of the Grey Wardens,” he rushes on, as if rehearsing a script. “Though I suspect your sensibilities have told you that much already.”

 

“So, this is how the Grey Wardens recruit?”

 

“Not typically, no,” Duncan seems distracted, glancing back and forth between Eska and the empty space beside him. He hesitates before continuing, “That is why I’m here, however.”

 

 _To recruit me?_ Eska nearly convinces himself to say it aloud. He could abandon this suicide mission and never face Beraht again. A lifetime spent killing darkspawn would certainly make better use of his time and talents.

 

As if he could ever really get away from Beraht.

 

Beraht would find out, find him, then flay him. Or delegate his flaying to good old Leske, while Beraht abandoned Rica in the Deep Roads and boarded up the Brosca home, air-tight, with Kalah still inside. And where would Ananth sleep, then?

 

As Eska drifts deeper into his paranoid daydream, Leske begins to sneak up on the pair.

 

“Will you be fighting today?” Duncan fills the silence, apparently at ease with Eska’s stern, silent staring.

 

Eska’s sharp laugh answers the question for him.

 

“Will you be?” Leske cuts in, having moved close enough to join them.

 

Duncan shakes his head. “Oh no, I haven’t anything to prove,” then smiles at Eska. “You’ll have to introduce me to your friend.”

 

“I might say the same thing, Eska,” Leske responds before his partner can, stepping toward the Grey Warden with his hand outstretched. “My name is Leske. Top class fighter and dedicated family man. Definitely Warden material but I’ll have to decline any offers,” Leske chuckles.

 

“Aha, and here I didn’t expect to be taking loses so soon,” Duncan laughs with Leske and exchanges a handshake before bowing to the pair, much deeper than necessary. “It would be a pleasure to remain and converse but I must carry on. I was escorted here with Princess Aeducan and she’ll be expecting my company back shortly.”

 

“She’ll understand,” Eska attests, though he isn’t sure why. It wasn’t as though he’d really met the Princess- had he? He didn’t even know her first name. He knew very little of the royal family at all, yet somehow today’s omens met in a way that tell him this.

 

Princess Aeducan would understand a delay, though noble and proud of it; she is the lenient sort.

 

“I didn’t know the King had a daughter,” Leske muses as Duncan hesitates. Four sons, was what he’d heard.

 

 _“I imagine this is very confusing for you,”_ Duncan says eventually, though Eska doesn’t hear his voice so much as _think_ it. _“You’re going to meet strangers who’ll be able to see parts of yourself, you didn’t even know were there. Soon you will know them in ways more intimate than you can yet understand.”_

 

“The best way to learn, is to keep experiencing it for yourself.” Duncan speaks this part aloud, stepping toward Eska. He drops a heavy hand on Eska’s shoulder, lifts and drops. A patting motion, Eska realises a moment later.

 

Eska stands a little taller. Beside him stands the elf from his vision, though now standing upright. When he turns to face them, he faces toward himself. In a moment he sees himself as though sandwiched between mirrors; an infinity of reflections.

 

He sees himself as he was before this all began. Himself before his brand, when he had a father. Before even that, before he ever saw himself as male.

 

Now he reflects, the visions return to him as unique copies of the same soul. His other selves.

 

An elf caged by human greed. Another, free as wind in the forest.

 

A dwarven Noblewoman still waiting to declare her womanhood.

 

A human Noblewoman confided, and confined, by her family.

 

A mage just come into magic, who’s only spent two nights in Kinloch Hold.

 

And a mage who’s lived under Kinloch’s Hold his entire life.

 

Heads hurt with how many selves are seen and felt at once. Touching so much with the mind alone is exhausting.

 

Eska wobbles under the weight of Duncan’s too-large hand.

 

Turi stands up but swears he must still be kneeling. The world has shrunk around him- or the walls here are needlessly tall.

 

* * *

 

Sulahn stretches out in the grass she lounges ‘pon, asking every God above when exactly she learnt to conduct such fluent Common conversations in her head, and _when_ to expect these prophecies’ end?

 

* * *

 

Kaeran taps her foot, to the world impatient for the Provings to start; inwardly, she revises her talking points and dreams of a day she can receive Gorim’s support and affection in _public_.

 

* * *

 

Eileen sinks into the softness of her mattress, covering her face with blankets. Even if the doctor hadn’t demanded she rest ‘til her bout of madness passed; hiding from the world was all she cared to do right now.

 

* * *

 

Myrrdin exits a Circle closet, arms full of fresh linens. The bundle of cloth and scented herbs is strewn across the floor just outside the closet, however, when a Templar accuses them of _loitering past curfew_ and declares a full body search.

 

* * *

 

Vhennug flattens himself against the top of the oversized bookshelf he’d climbed. He tucks an open book closer to his face, keeping very quiet, and throws himself back into the written histories.

 

* * *

 

Eska watches Duncan’s face with his furrowed, angry stare.

 

He isn’t really angry, though; Turi knows because he feels confusion run deep into the boy’s heart. Like it blossomed from Turi’s own heart, he feels it. In seven hearts, perhaps.

 

Crossing Ferelden in barely more than a second, from the privacy of your hived mind, was a naturally confusing experience; especially for the first time. The ripple of confusion reflects in every corner of Ferelden. Eska dwells upon it, dreadful of the worst.

 

Then Turi’s confusion forms in him like faith. Kaeran’s sparks curiousity. Boundaries of the mind expand to support a widening scope of emotion.

 

Flanking Eska, like an aura of divinity, Princess Kaeran appears the watchful stone guardian. Her hand rests on Eska’s shoulder, blending into Duncan’s; at the same time, Duncan rests his hand upon her shoulder, too. Supporting her, and all of her cluster, in a second of connection.

 

When that second passes, Turi still holds close his newfound curiousity; his gifted, grounding dread.

 

Back in the prison cell he sits in, Turi repetitively signs to himself. ‘ _It’s okay, It’s alright’._ The gestures bump into the restraints on his wrists, barely readable as sign language, but the motions are enough to soothe Turi.

 

As he signs to himself – ‘ _this is fine, I’m okay’_ – he scans over the cage around him. It is poorly constructed. Not something its builder could rightly be proud of. Although for a barbaric lord’s secret torture chamber, Turi supposes, it was serviceable.

 

His labourer’s eye spots out obvious flaws in the structure. Each steel bar has been spaced from the next imprecisely; any one of these inconsistent gaps might just be wide enough for Turi’s slight frame to squeeze through.

 

He tries them all; measuring his chest against the space between bars. He shimmies each bar in their dent as he goes. Only a couple are still grouted in position. It could be possible to just…

 

With both hands firmly around one bar, Turi yanks it upwards with all his strength. Using the leather restraints to brace the steel, he twists and buckles. It shifts only slightly at first. When he grows bolder in his attempts to move it, one end lifts far enough out of its groove to scrape against the floor.

 

The screech it makes is nearly unbearable. Turi flinches, then heaves upward again.

 

With no more space above it, the top of the bar grinds loudly against the ceiling. It bends out for a moment – or seems to – before snapping back into its groove and slamming into stone. Turi falls backwards with the momentum, and turns immediately to the door.

 

Metal bars still reverberate with the force of the impact.

 

That would definitely draw guards.

 

“- _Fuck_ are you doing in there?” A voice croaks from the adjacent room.

 

Turi slides across the ground and presses his back against the far wall. He stills, listening for the humans’ approach.

 

After a beat, nothing. Then he hears a muffled yelp and a heavy _thud_.

 

The prison door swings open.

 

Turi sees Shianni pass through the doorway with far more weapons than seems practical. She wields a sword in each hand, elbows bumping the hilts of more strapped under her belt.

 

Turi scrambles to his feet as Shianni gingerly releases her jaw’s grip off a third sword she’d had clenched by the blade between teeth. It lands with an echoing _clang!_ against the stone floor but before it can settle, Shianni kicks out to send it skidding under the cage door towards Turi.

 

He doesn’t dip his head to look at it, too entranced by his sword-laden hero. She kneels by the lock; another _clang_ as the weapon tips meet the stone floor. Shianni curses under her breath, then glances up at Turi with earnest relief.

 

“I’m really - I’m not exaggerating, I’m the happiest I’ve ever been in my life to see you … up. _Alive_ \- well-” she huffs, taking a moment to catch her breath. Only a very quick moment, though. Her hands and knees shake as she hurries a glance over both shoulders and digs through her pockets.

 

Turi steps to the bars and reaches through to her. She shuffles close enough to let him squeeze her shoulder fondly and blink his everlasting gratitude.

 

“I’m gonna get you out of here,” Shianni promises, occupying herself with the lock and a fine rod. “Why does this asshole need so many _cages?”_

 

Turi smiles at her candid muttering. He was always grateful for how easily her idle thoughts filled silence between them. The running commentary was usually a source of great comfort, something to ground him. He doesn’t manage to appreciate it wholly, however; as some distant voice, with booming resonance, echoes inside his head.

 

 _... “Joining us in the stands tonight_ for this very special _Proving…”_

 

As Turi turns in place, the cage bars dissipate and the room expands tenfold. The shouting in his head echoes off distant walls, as dozens upon dozens more screaming voices join the chorus.

 

“…the youngest _and swiftest_ of King Endrin’s royal heirs; Kaeran Aeducan, himself! As well as the mighty Commander of the Grey Wardens, Duncan.” As if introduced by stage direction, Turi is pulled back into the scene.

 

He is in two- three, maybe _seven_ places at once.

 

He stands at the fighter’s entrance to a stadium field. In his left arm, he wields a stolen axe. In his right, a stolen mace. Strapped to his shoulder by a stolen leather band hangs a stolen shield; around his waist, in a stolen scabbard, sits a stolen sword.

 

Settled awkwardly across his forehead: a poorly fitting stolen helm. Which, tonight, would protect both his skull and his stolen identity.

 

He isn’t Turi. He isn’t just Eska. He might be Everd.

 

_...“Got it!”_

He is standing in a monster’s basement as his cousin Shianni pops the cage door open. With a satisfied _whoop_ , she rushes in. She thrusts a blade into Turi’s restraints, peeling away ruined leather. Then turns her attention, finally, to his face.

 

“How bad are you?” Her fingers hover just above Turi’s cheek- _because I am wearing a helm_ , he thinks _._ Though it badly fits, because it isn’t his, _it isn’t mine_.

 

No, he isn’t wearing a helm. He doesn’t own any armour. Shianni hovers her fingers above bare bruised cheeks because she is afraid of touching raw wounds.

 

* * *

 

_Everyone is going to notice this isn’t my helmet._

_Everyone will notice I’m an imposter._

_Everyone will see through this cheap façade._

 

_Everyone is waiting._

**_“The Warrior Everd, son of Galten!”_ **

 

Eska rarely heard anyone refer to him in the masculine with such normality.

 

Whether or not it was related, a fleeting sense of freedom sweeps over him. He has been uncaged. Liberation swells his chest with a sudden confidence that this foolish plan might work, that he’ll win the Proving in Everd’s name and that fool would nap on none the wiser, cradling his bottle the whole time.

 

Eska imagines celebrating later with Leske and Rica. Maybe even his mother would join them...

 

The muffled roar of the stadium audience greets him when he jogs onto the battlefield. Everd’s plate armor _clang_ s uncomfortably with every step he takes. Surely, any moment now, someone would notice the armor doesn’t fit him properly and catch him out.

 

But nobody does.

 

The audience’s cheer dies down, and the Proving Master calls Mainar to the field. The Warrior jogs on lazily. The poison’s effects are subtle, dragging down limbs, but only warping his reaction times; not truly slowing them. Although Mainar attempts to enter in a confident line, he eventually winds and wanders into place.

 

Even so, the stadium vibrates with a far louder roar of greeting than _Everd_ had received. Eska doesn’t take it personally, of course. Everd was supposedly a nobody of barely any standing; which was why his winning would be so lucrative. For Beraht.

 

The very second the match begins, Eska’s opponent charges him. Eska holds his ground, waiting for the opposing warrior to begin an attack.

 

As Mainar lifts his mace, Eska ducks forward and slams Everd’s axe into his opponent’s hipbone. He thrusts heavily against the ties holding Mainar’s leg armor in place.

 

As soon as Mainar shifts that leg, his cuisse falls away. The plate protecting his calf slumps away, unsupported. Now a significant weight for the fighter, rather than a significant advantage.

 

Though, as Eska readjusts his stolen helmet, he thinks of it more like evening out the battlefield. Poison notwithstanding.

 

Everd’s helmet wobbles and cants to the side again as Eska takes another swing with Everd’s axe.

 

Mainar trips backwards over his sabotaged armour, managing to dodge Eska’s attack only by falling flat on his back.

 

Eska brings the blunt of Everd’s mace down on his opponent’s exposed thigh, warranting a hateful cry from the fighter. He drops it there, freeing a hand to grab at Mainar’s shield, wresting it from its wielder’s grip and ripping the strap of leather that holds it to his arm.

 

As quickly as he can, Eska brings the shield back down on Mainar’s sword-hand. The gauntlet Mainar wears dents into his knuckles, effectively forcing his weapon out of his grip.

 

The audience above hollers in offense at the disarming.

 

Eska bears it little mind, tossing Mainar’s shield behind him. His opponent bends backwards away from him but it helps little. Soon Everd’s axe blade is digging between Mainar’s helmet and gorget, popping rivets out of position.

 

One rivet hits Mainar in the neck as it flies off. He coughs weakly and raises both hands in protest.

 

“This isn’t to the death,” Mainar wheezes.

 

The audience heaves in unison. Out flows a common breath of disappointment. Eska might be an expert in swift assassinations but the Proving was a stadium for _entertainment_ as well politic. His skillset had easily won him the battle but the crowd’s silence tells him clearly: he has lost their favour.

 

* * *

 

Atop the spectator's booth, the same thought spins in the mind of the youngest Aeducan. A swift execution is scarcely in the spirit of these grand and generous Proving Grounds. She found that out on the night they named her _the quickest fighter in the history of House Aeducan_. Here on this very field.

 

 _It’s now or never,_ she tells herself.

 

All it takes is a measured nod from the princess to set her plan in motion.

 

Princess Kaeran’s Second-In-Command, Gorim Saelac, passes on her nod to the Proving Master, like lighting a beacon. Of course; they cannot deny her, if even they want to – no dwarf of a lesser house would dare. An Aeducan had the authority to act upon any and every whim they conceived of.

 

Duncan leans toward her, whispering low. Down on the stadium’s floor, Eska hears the man’s voice as though he were sitting in Kaeran’s seat.

 

“You’re going ahead with it after all, Lady Aeducan?”

 

Kaeran’s polite smile edges up on wicked as she stands. Only Gorim can see her hardened edge for the toiling anxiety it is.

 

“Good luck, my lady,” he nods and moves aside.

 

She steps into the boombox – so named for the way one’s voice echoes over the entire Grounds from the small standing room.

 

“Stone-met, Champions!” Kaeran addresses the crowd, which roars incoherently in response. Translated from Audience to Common, it would become ‘ _Stone-met, Speaker!’_. “Before we begin, allow me to state my terms.” She clears her throat.

 

“When I fight today, it will not be as a Noble-man,” she lets the word sink into the crowd before diving deeper, “but instead, as a _Warrior_ , as a _woman_ , and most importantly, as proudly and as honorably as the Ancestor’s envision.” A swell of applause rises and falls across the audience.

 

“Tonight, my fellow dwarva, I fight to prove a very modest fact, one which should unite us all: That _anydwarf_ can be born to _anything!_ What truly defines us is not the status of our parentage but what we _choose_ to fight for!” The message slowly takes form in the conscious of Kaeran’s audience, who jitter with it timidly at first. “What really defines us among our peers are the banners we hang, the battles we declare- those within, and those without.

 

“All dwarva share in battle within these walls. We likewise all harbor a battle of the spirit and of the stone, within our most honest selves if not within the stone itself. Tonight, my fellow dwarva, I have come to share my personal battle. I have indeed concluded that I am no Prince, and no son to my father, though you have once known me as such. From this night onward, you shall know me as your Princess Kaeran Aeducan, Lady of the Passenger’s Court.

 

“To mark this moment – dare I say, to celebrate it - I draw our Ancestors’ attention to this matter of Stone’s embrace, and fight to honour the cause!”

 

The crowd cheers her speech – the Princess has heard every cheer and cry in every shade of sincerity at some point in her rich, well-kept life; she hears the entire spectrum again in the stadium’s response. Many celebrate her presence; her command of the stadium she stands in; her name of Aeducan, and the generations of Noble dwarves and Paragons who lived before her. _Those_ , Kaeran dwells, _cheer in vain opposition to this sentiment_.

 

Some in the stadium cheer on in confusion, having not understood her intent but registering their obligated enthusiasm – or indeed, their very real and passionate enthusiasm - regardless.

 

Few of the cries are genuine. The dozen who understand her, perhaps relating to her position in some manner, scream out in voices devoid of true cheer; _this is what makes them pure_ , Kaeran muses. In their honest emptiness, those voices crack and speak above the noise.

 

One voice intones in polished clanking, with metal shafts pounding together: In Everd’s armor, Eska bangs Everd’s mace and axe against one another rhythmically. He stands upon the stadium grounds every bit as overwhelmed as he was an hour earlier. Try as he might, he cannot muster any more fear, any more exhilaration, any more of anything at all. So, he was to fight a princess tonight as well. Come what may.

 

Eska continues on drumming his beat, picking up members of the audience here and there. And soon enough, them all.

 

The Grounds pulse with the rhythm of a thousand dwarves beating their feet on the stadium seats.

 

Gorim passes Kaeran her sword and shield, and both catch the other tapping a foot to the audience’s beat.

 

“The speech was perfect,” Gorim beams at her, then beckons her to the staircase leading to the stadium’s battlefield. As Kaeran descends to fight, leaving the Proving Master to hastily re-arrange the battle schedule, she walks in time with the rhythm, right up until she reaches her mark.

 

There, she greets _The Warrior Everd_ with a grand bow and a proud grin. “May the Ancestors watch on and cheer in your name!” Kaeran bellows, lowering the visor of her helm and readying herself for the duel.

 

“And honor to you, fair lady!” Eska’s voice strains to sound deeper than its natural cadence.

 

Kaeran and Eska meet eyes then, seeing one another as a sibling of sympathetic sensibilities. Each takes their first step sideways when the Proving Master calls the match to start.

 

Kaeran moves first. Whip-quick, she hops forward and kicks Eska roughly in the shin. His armor shifts out of place and throws him off balance.

 

He may have direct contact with her thoughts but she acts on them far too swiftly to make any sense of the process. Her constant repositioning has Eska trailing backwards. It takes most of his effort to plant his plated feet firmly, and keep himself from tripping over.

 

He can sense Kaeran’s next move now; see it like a string of images laid out side by side. He shuffles backwards desperately. She circles and circles, trying to position herself behind him. The shield in her hand is barely more than a _display_ , Eska thinks, telling her enemies to _beware a well-defended Warrior_ when she was, truthfully, a Rogue.

 

Eska sneers. He had been expecting to fight a Warrior; now he was losing to dirty little _scoundrel_.

 

Kaeran, meanwhile, is having a perfectly lovely time chasing Everd’s suit of armor across the stadium grounds. The audience enjoys it too, whooping and cheering, some shouting out a reminder for Eska to “ _watch your step!”_

 

Of course, Eska doesn’t need reminding.

 

He stops, dropping his mace to pull Everd’s shield off his shoulder. He directs his opponent’s next three attacks into the body of the shield. He considers pushing forward and trying to knock Kaeran to the ground.

 

The second it crosses his mind, he’s leaping forward, thrown into an unexpected momentum by the weight of his new plate skin. Rougher than intended, his shield slams squarely into Kaeran’s chest. She’s on her back for no more than a second before rolling over and pushing herself up.

 

Eska makes no attack; not even while Kaeran is prone. He is absorbed, watching as the very conscious Everd stumbles under the fighter’s entrance, onto the grounds.

 

“Did I miss it?” Everd slurs, squinting intently at his stolen arms and armor. “Hey! That’s _mine!_ ”

 

Suddenly, Eska no longer imagines celebrating his success later.


End file.
